


Black Hole Ben

by maenad9



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Ending, Ben and Finn are friends, Better Than Canon, Blow Jobs, Brooding, Consensual Kink, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Force Bond (Star Wars), Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Kylo Ren Needs a Hug, Kylo Ren in Leggings, Lake Country Estate, Light Bondage, Married Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Planet Naboo (Star Wars), Prince Ben Solo, Reminiscing, Reylo - Freeform, Roleplay, Royalty, Swimming, Theed (Star Wars), Wet Clothing, smooches
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-27
Updated: 2020-05-03
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:48:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 10,355
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23344246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maenad9/pseuds/maenad9
Summary: Rey could heal him. Rey could bring back Ben, yet again. Kylo just had to falter in step, ease out of the mask he still wore in spirit, show his vulnerable side— if only to her, if only with his widened eyes...***It can be hard to adjust to a life of peace when all you've ever known is war...A series of scenes, all concerning Rey and Ben's married life, politics, and personal happenings. Sweet, sad, sexy, silly. Minimal plot. HEA!***Canon compliant up until TROS because holy sith that sucked, didn't it?
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 14
Kudos: 57





	1. Kylo Returns

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben returns from a political trip wearing a black cloak and a Kylo expression. Rey's musings as she watches him from across the tarmac.

He still wore black. Striding across the landing platform, striking out from the small cluster of disembarked passengers, Kylo was as imperious and brooding as the day she first met him. Black was his colour. A colour— or lack thereof, he had once corrected her— so dark, so rich, so deep that it seemed to draw Rey into the black hole of _him._ Or maybe it was antimatter, and she was tripping out of reality and into memory…

For a moment, she was back on Takodana. Untrained in the force, but uneasily aware of its constant thrumming through her soul. He’d been her enemy then, and she had _hated_ him. Not that they’d ever met. They hadn’t be granted the opportunity to meet, like real people do, for another three years. Interrogations and force visions counted in Rey’s opinion, though— those were critical, the foundation and formation of their relationship. But a person at war with the world and themselves is not a whole person, is not a healed person. And until either of them had the chance to be whole, to heal, unbothered by bloodshed, both had been but wild animals in the eyes of the world. _Crazed, desperate, confused._

She was confused right now, at the surge of memories brought on by the mere sight of him. She was desperate, too— for his gentle touch, for the vibrato of his voice, for those lush lips that, at the moment, were pinched into a frustrated frown. But Rey wasn’t crazed or crazy, whatever her Resistance friends might say. She loved Ben Solo, or Kylo Ren, or whatever he wanted to her to call him then. She loved him, and she wasn’t letting go.

Regardless, Rey had long since realized that their courtship, as Ben liked to call it, was as far from normal as could be. Many people still didn’t recognize their love as real. (When he was Ben, he liked to tease the public about this, sweeping her into startling kisses, letting the many suns act as spotlights, taunting the disdainful and the disbelievers with displays of affection that left little to the imagination. When he was Kylo, he brooded and snapped. Rey knew to keep her distance then, when the old ghosts whispered cruel lies to him— no matter how much she wanted to drown them out with a flood of love through the force-bond, protect her precious partner from the atrocities and abuse that at intervals haunted him.)

He was Kylo today as he stormed across the tarmac, in a cloak whose heavy folds flung themselves out to the wind’s break. His formidable figure needed no garment’s assistance, but everything Kylo wore acquired a dramatic affect by association— and amplified the inherent drama of _him_. This simple, broad swath was no exception: it rippled and rolled in the open air, edges whipping up and curling in on themselves. Vividly, Rey was reminded of the sea, salt water torn between an indomitable tide and some storm’s rage-fueled frenzy. A sea like that of the ocean moon on which they’d fought, when she’d been someone else and he’d only ever raised his saber in defense. But on that day Kylo’s garments had been suffocatingly sodden. Soaked, the dense fabric had clung close, constricting his movements, giving her the advantage— and forcing him to realize, materially, just how claustrophobic and choking his allegiance with the dark side and its secular, political equivalent could be. 

(In retrospect, they agreed the universe had laid that metaphor on a little thick.)

Nevertheless, the aforementioned realization he’d confessed unprompted one morning, as they hung a load of laundry to dry. Standing there in the sunken courtyard on Tatooine, Rey had simply stared at him across the arid space. It took her a second to answer, as she wasn’t yet used to his opening up to her— but later that night, she’d thanked the stars for his willingness to be vulnerable, to let in the day’s light.

Kylo didn’t look so vulnerable today, nor so open to the light of day. His gaze was fixed on the rough pavement beneath her feet, avoiding her face— she wondered if he was shuttering intentionally. Alone and wrapped in a starless night that seemed to suck what little life there was to suck from the landing platform that surrounded them, he seemed as closed off from her as he’d been that day in the interrogation room. Not begging her to join him, extending one large open hand, but forcing her out of his heart with all the wrath of a mind violated— it didn’t matter that her probe had been accidental, when his attempt was beyond unsuccessful. Rey wondered if his current mood would backfire, wondered which of them would be burned in the implosion.

She didn’t care, truth be told, so long as her lover once again opened. His mind, heart, body— any or all— to her inquisitive tenderness. Rey could heal him. Rey could bring back Ben, yet again. Kylo just had to falter in step, ease out of the mask he still wore in spirit, show his vulnerable side— if only to her, if only with his wide eyes.

Rey reached out to him, then, as he came within a click of her. Sent a tendril of tentative concern spiraling through their bond. Quick as a blaster, his dark head shot up. The wind swept his raven locks from his face, and even at a distance Rey could see the rage simmering in his expression, the suspicion, the hint of desperation. A wounded animal, still, she mused and wondered what they’d done to him on Coruscant to put him in such a terrible mood. Poor darling. Her darling. Without realizing it, that shiver of warmth went through the force to him, too, and he responded with a flash of heat so intense she stepped back out of a scavenger’s instinct.

Their eyes locked, and Rey held back a sigh at what she saw in his stare. _Need, hunger, anger, hurt._ The former overpowered the latter as he halved the distance between them, exerting himself suddenly in search of proximity. Comfort. Love, really. Rey found herself in the throne room again, raising her own outstretched hand.

 _Come back to me, my love_. The whisper echoed through the force-bond, and she wasn’t sure which one of them had sent it. _Come back to me, and I will make you whole._ Perhaps the dyadic nature of their connection was speaking for itself. Beckoning both, summoning them. All Rey knew was that in an instant, his fingers were woven through hers, and the wind no longer whipped her skin as Kylo drew her deep into his cloak.

“I missed you,” she murmured, pressing her cheek against his chest.

“I needed you,” he answered, voice cracking at the edge.

They stood like that on the tarmac, their very own black hole of hurt and healing, lashing rage and real love, until Rey couldn’t remember where her body began and Ben’s ended. Until they shared a heartbeat, and a force signature, once more.


	2. Kylo Has A Good Cry (And A Good Wife)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben tells Rey a bit about what happened to make him so edgy. More fluff, more angst. It's alright to cry, my guy.

When all the other passengers had made their way inside, and dispersed in their various directions, Rey pulled back. Ben’s arms had snuck around her waist, holding her almost too tight to him, as if he were afraid he’d lose her again. Inside their warm circle, and the night-like cover of his cloak, Rey pushed up onto the tips of her toes and pressed a fleeting kiss to the line of his lips. One hand went up to caress his cheek, thumb running gently down the scar she’d given him on Starkiller, while the other snaked around to her back, fingers prying at the fist that clasped the seam of her lilac tulle dress.

Taking him by that gloved hand, Rey spun out of his grip and started to lead him away. The muscles in his face and neck were relaxing now, but that bitter furrow still marked his brow. They needed to go inside, to the privacy of their personal suite, and take comfort in each other’s company. Then, maybe, they would talk. Seeming to understand all this from her simple movement, or perhaps just trusting her to lead him somewhere he’d feel safe, Ben followed.

It took him half a stride to fall into step beside her, and Rey didn’t hide her admiring glance at his long, muscular legs, sheathed as they were in smooth, worn leather. Perhaps he would let her strip his trousers from him— later, when he wasn’t feeling so… black-hearted, and bloody-minded. Well, that’s what his brooding expression was communicating, she thought with a shrug. At the very least, she’d get him to unburden himself, wordlessly if necessary. Rey wove her fingers between Ben’s, and listened to the quiet rhythm of his heartbeat.

A few minutes and three curved stairwells later, they entered the royal chambers from a secret panel behind a carved pillar. Rey had guided Ben the back way to their rooms, knowing too well how he’d want to avoid prying courtiers’ and politicians eyes. Not that he’d needed her help finding the antechamber his grandmother had inhabited in all those years ago, but he seemed a little out of it and all too happy to be leddown dim corridors by the hand.

Closing the panel behind them with her sandaled heel, Rey brought Ben over to a comfortable settee. Against the plush green fabric, his skin seemed a little less sallow. They sat, and Rey waited to see if he would make the first move. Apparently not.

“What’s happened?” She asked, her tone at once brisk and gentle.

Ben just shook his head, looking mournful. His wrath from a few minutes ago had evaporated like dew in the meadows by their getaway estate in lake country. Rey wished they were there, where everything was lush and serene, so that Ben could recuperate from whatever new trauma he’d acquired in peace, undisturbed by the bustling business of the palace and its creatures. She could weave star blossoms in his hair, and he’d sing her lullabies from his childhood— when the world still seemed safe and warm and good. Well, for Ben, at least. Rey would forget her arid childhood if she only could.

Sensing the turn of her thoughts, Ben raised his head to gaze at her, pupils wide and dark as he seemed to drink the sight of his lover in. Rey smiled shyly— still, after all those years as the public face of the Resistance, she shivered under Ben’s simple stare. It wasn’t invasive, at least not in an uncomfortable way, but there was something about the way he looked at her. Penetrating, was the word she’d probably use if asked. Often laden with innuendo… although at the moment he was peering unromantically into the heart of her, trying to find out what was wrong without asking the obvious question. Well, she wasn’t going to let him off that easily.

“This isn’t about me, Ben.” She said, sharply. Nevertheless, he probed her mind with his. But Rey would have none of that. Throwing up mental blocks, and cutting off his access to her through the force, Rey shook her head once. “You don’t have to tell me what’s wrong right now— I can wait for those walls to come down. But you’re not going to throw me off course by making this about me.” She paused, her voice softening as she squeezed his hand, reminding Ben that she was there for him, quite literally. “If my heart hurts, it’s hurting for you.”

Ben sighed and the frown on his face relaxed. His expression settled into tired resignation, and Rey knew that they were close to a revelation. She scooted closer to him, offering silent encouragement because Ben didn’t respond well to the overeager listener. He extricated himself from her grip to remove his black leather gloves, finger by careless finger, and toss them onto the small table beside the settee. They landed with a soft thud next to the vase of star-blossoms, white and bright as their namesake in the sky. Ben turned back to Rey with a bitten lip, and took her delicate fingers in his strong hands, now bare. Only he was the delicate one this afternoon, Rey reminded herself; she would have to be strong for him. And his warm and weathered palms weren’t the only thing he’d be baring.

After a long pause, in which Rey said nothing, just waited for his pulse to slow, Ben answered her first question. He spoke in a shaken voice, the words coming out on a harsh exhale. “It’s Dad. Han. He— he came up after the negotiation.”

How Rey wished the double meaning those words held could be the truth. How she wished, for Ben’s sake, and Leia’s, and hers, and most of all Han’s, that her would-be father-in-law were alive and well, and that the worst of Ben’s worries was that his father had come up to him after a political event and said something upsetting. But that would never be, because Han was dead and Kylo Ren had killed him. She’d seen it herself, hadn’t she? Well, this explained the Kylo act, earlier on the tarmac.

Rey tried not to let her body tense with hatred for Snoke— Palpatine, whatever— then. She forced her breathing to stay even, shoved the storm clouds from her mind. If only someone had stopped them. If only someone had gotten to him. If only _she_ had been there for Ben when he needed her… well, none of this would have happened. The grooming, the poisoning, the greedy brutality; the shame and self-hatred those evil men had stoked in him.Her heart ached— no, _raged_ for the man before her. The infant whose mind was preyed on, the boy whose spirit was broken, the young man whose soul had been stained black as the hole left behind by a stolen sun. Starkiller Base hadn’t just been the location of Han’s death at the hand’s of his son. It haunted Rey, a sick metaphor for the abuse her lover had endured, for everything they’d done to him, for all that he’d become.

Rey’s rage must have bled through their bond, despite her best effort to shield Ben. He flinched at the force of her feelings, no doubt stabbing at his already bleeding heart. She could feel his confusion and fear, his shame rising like bile— he thought she was angry with him, for killing Han. He didn’t understand, because she hadn’t said it aloud, that her fury was reserved for the monsters who had sought to make him one of them. And very nearly succeeded, if the war was evidence of anything other than evil’s eternal grip on the galaxy. _Fuck_. She needed to make him understand.

Ben started to pull away, shrink into himself. The motion would have looked absurd, tall and broad as he was, if it weren’t matched by a pained twist of his mouth and the widening of those dark brown eyes, the look of a soul in agony. Remorse flooded the force bond, and Rey shuddered under the weight of Ben’s emotional burden. She’d done this to him, made this fresh hurt, by trying to hide the extent of her own feelings— as a result, she’d obscured their nature but none of their violence.

Rey tugged Ben closer even as he shied away. Moving quickly, she wrapped her arms around his massive torso, one hand automatically reaching up to smooth the curls at the nape of his neck. “It’s alright,” she murmured, when he didn’t instantly relax. “I’m not mad, my love. I’m not mad at you.” She pulled back to look him in the eye, making sure he understood her this time.

“I’m furious with the men who did this— not you,” she cut him off before he could protest,” but the people who put you in that position, who tried to make you like them. The monsters.” She sighed, and Ben blinked back tears. “You’re not a monster, Ben. You tried, and you turned out to be quite bad at it, in fact.” They laughter, tearily, together at that. “We’ve had this conversation a hundred times, and we’ll have it a thousand more if we have to. But you’re not a monster, and I’m not mad at you.”

“But I killed him,” he whispered, his head bowed to hide his tears. They fell, hot and salty, on their intertwined fingers anyway.

“He sacrificed himself for you,” she replied firmly. This was a hard line, drawn in bloodied sand. Rey had rationalized everything that had happened on Starkiller long ago. She understood more than anyone, except maybe Leia, what went down on that bridge between father and son. What had led to it. What had come of it. The how’s, the who’s, the why’s. And in his own way, Ben had come to terms with the events of that night, too. It had taken time— not to mention talking and listening and a whole lot of loving— but he’d made peace with himself and his father’s ghost.

Rey wondered what had happened at Coruscant to cause him to question himself so strongly. Something, or someone, had shaken Ben badly. But she knew him, knew his tells, could feel the slowing of his heart rate and the calm come over their bond. He would tell her, any second now— as soon as the tears tided over. Ben swallowed a sob, and Rey bent to kiss his glossy black hair.

She smiled a little at the jealousy she’d once, distractingly felt— in the forest, in the snow, when his hair bounced and shone. It was silly— no, it was juvenile and foolish— but she’d felt a tinge of dark green envy, knowing her mousy brown buns would never turn heads. Well, his excepting. These days, she liked to experiment with braided updos that befit her new station, but nothing matched the ease of movement and familiar comfort of her simple vertical loops. Besides, Leia liked them— she said they reminded her of her own iconic buns, which (unlike Rey’s) had been the talk of Alderaan, long before either she or Ben was born. Not long before that planet had been lost, obliterated by the old order, the empire…

Some time later, after Rey had murmured as many endearments as she could think of into the goofily oversized shell of his ear, Ben’s chest ceased to heave. That reservoir from which his tears rolled must have dried up, because he lifted his beautiful head and looked at her with red and puffy but definitely dry eyes. There was courage in his gaze, a glint of bravery that had her holding back a grin. Rey wanted to beam at her husband’s resolve, his willingness to be vulnerable and open with her, about even the hardest of topics. And this was, apart from a handful of other heartbreaks, the hardest of topics.

“It was Uncl—” He cut himself off, and took a steadying breath. “Chewbacca,” he finally said in a flatter voice. “It was Chewbacca, and no one understood him but me.” He dwindled on that thought. “Except, well, they all _understood_ him.”

Rey sighed deeply. She loved that Wookiee, and knew Ben did too. He’d almost referred to him by his childhood nickname: Uncle Chewie. Before he’d caught himself. Rey had noticed a surge of complex emotions when he started to say his name, and likewise a kind of shutting down, emotionally, enacted deliberately. They’d work on that, together. But for now, maybe it was the only way Ben could bear to share this story. Rey let him be.

“What did he say?”

“Doesn’t matter,” Ben mumbled quickly, darting a guilty look at Rey. “Just more proof that he won't ever forgive me…”

At that, Ben’s face started to crumple once more, and quickly Rey raised her free hand to his cheek— as if to physically support it.

“Hey,” she said softly. “He’ll get there.” She hoped. “Chewie just needs time. He’ll come around.”

Ben’s gaze turned skeptical.

“He cares about you, babe. So much.” Rey bit her lip, uncertain as to how to proceed. “You’re still his little Bennie, deep down. Just like he’s still your Uncle Chewie, inside.”

He grimaced. “Maybe. I dunno. I just— I just wish none of this had ever happened.”

“I know, darling. Me too.” With her thumb, she gently swiped a fresh tear as it slid from under his thick lashes. “Now tell me the rest.” The sooner the story was out of Ben, the better. He needed to be able to breathe without this secret shame constricting his every inhale.

Ben shrugged to the best of his ability, what with her arms still wrapped loosely around his torso. “There’s not much to tell, really.” He sniffled, and Rey smiled a little.

Her ferocious husband, the infamous Sith apprentice— such a sweetheart… a real softie. Sometimes, she just wanted to smush his big nose, press wet kisses all over his broad face. Sometimes he let her... but this afternoon, she’d better not push him. Her Ben was having a hard enough time telling her what had happened already, he didn’t need to try it while being smothered by his wife. He’d sate her touch-starved heart later that night, when she commented for the thousandth time that she never knew a bed could be so big— or bouncy. Swallowing an anticipatory grin, Rey turned all her affectionate attention back to Ben, who was beginning to relate the insignificant rest.

Half an hour of confessions, reassurances, and honeyed kisses later, Rey unfolded herself from Ben’s embrace. Stretching as she stood, she let out a yawn that caught her husband’s attention.

“Oh, have I been boring you with my self-pity?” He asked in that playful way. Rey grinned and turned to face him.

“Dreadfully,” she announced, and yanked him up from the settee with all her strength. He was a heavy man, her husband. All muscle, and sinew, and… _man._ Ben leapt agilely from the nest they’d made of decorative pillows and in one graceful movement swept Rey into his arms. Turning the tables on her even further, he dipped her low and took her mouth in a long, devastating kiss.

When Ben righted them both, Rey was a little breathless, and struggled to find the words to speak. He shushed her and glanced out the wall of windows, remarking on beautiful the afternoon had grown. Rey’s eyes followed his to the brilliant view the Amidalan rooms afforded. They were situated high in the palace, itself perched atop the jutting clifftops. Below them, waterfalls tumbled over rock, as metropolitan tributaries joined the Solleu River, its serene surface a shimmering cerulean in the late summer sun.

“I see my mother left us a hologram,” he murmured after a moment’s appreciative silence, and nodded towards the blinking display on the desk.

“How do you know that’s your mother?” Rey asked in a playfully impertinent tone.

“ _The Force_ ,” Ben whispered with exaggerated drama, wiggling his fingers for effect.

Rey choked on a laugh. “Now that’s shaak-shit. The force doesn’t tell you who’s on the answering machine.”

Ben, very clearly trying not to smile, stayed in character a little longer. “Ah, but you are young in the ways of the force, my wife.” Rey rolled her eyes.

“I’m exactly as powerful as you are, Ben.”

“Yes, my love, but power is not the same thing as strength.” He dropped the Jedi persona, a wicked gleam in his eyes. “Do you know what you need, my love?”

Bloody hell, she knew where this was going. Not unamused, Rey gestured for him to continue.

“You need a teacher!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> RIP Han, Star Wars' hottest dad.


	3. Late for an Important Date!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben dawdles before dinner at the royal court; Rey is anxious not to disappoint. Some light-hearted fluff, a quarter portion of fun. Calligraphy? Too much. Kissing? Not enough!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Imagine Rey in the green gown from Atonement, if you need a visual.

“We’re going to be late, Ben!“ It was the third time Rey had called to him in five minutes, and Ben knew she must be getting anxious, but he just had to finish this last flourish on the thank you note. A little tug on the back of his dinner jacket nearly ruined the last sweep of his ink-dipped brush. Ben turned in annoyance, expecting to see his wife behind him, but there was no one. She must have used the force from the other room. Smiling a little at the imagined sight of his fiesty, frustrated wife waiting in the antechamber, Ben returned his attentions to the paper.

“One second, Rey, I just need to—”

“We have to go _now_ , Ben! I promised Leia we wouldn’t be late again!” Her voice lowered an ominous, yet somehow still shrill octave. “You _know_ what all the courtiers are going to think if we show up ten minutes past time.”

Ben chuckled a little, curling the last letter with practiced precision. “What, that I’ve force-choked you to death?”

He could _feel_ her eye roll through the bond. And he heard what sounded suspiciously like a stamped foot, muffled by the carpet in the other room and the wall that separated them.

“Ben Solo that is _not_ what they think of you.”

Ben heaved an exaggerated sigh as he carefully cleaned and stowed his calligraphy set. The same one he’d left on Ahch-to, rescued by a curious and thoughtful Rey. She’d even gotten the rust off one of his wheedling knives before returning it as a birthday gift. And what a birthday that had been…

Standing, he straightened his black silk court suit and opened the door to the antechamber, where Rey waited for him wearing an arch expression.

“No? Well then maybe they’ll think that I’ve force-choked you into the kind of death…”

Rey blushed with the force of a binary sunset. His beautiful, easily baited bride. Ben laughed deep in his belly, the sound rumbling like thunder clouds. It had rained on the day of their wedding, he remembered with a fond smile. A smile that turned into a slackened mouth as his jaw dropped upon taking the full sight of her in.

“You’re wearing _that_?”

She grimaced a little, self-conscious despite the evident awe in his tone. “You don’t think it’s too simple? I just wasn’t comfortable in that dress Leia sent me, the one your grandmother wore— it’s too grand for a scavenger, and besides in this one I can run or fight if I need to…”

Rey gestured to a high slit that revealed nearly the full length of her tanned leg. Ben’s eyes fixed on the supple skin, the flex of her powerful musculature. He nearly drooled.

“I can go back and change if you think she’ll be insulted? I didn’t mean to be rude, I just could imagine wearing something that— that—” Her hands gesticulated wildly for a moment as she tried to find a word for what she wasn’t wearing. But when Rey saw Ben’s slack-jawed expression, she didn’t resume her little ramble.

“My face is up here, husband,” she muttered sharply, although as Ben (with great effort) raised his head he noticed the pink flush effusing her cheeks that signaled her distinct lack of displeasure.

Grinning, he answered, “I apologize, my love; I was momentarily stunned by your beauty. Pierced me like a saber to the stomach,” he added with a wink.

Rey smothered a laugh and started on some sardonic retort, but through their bond Ben could feel her faint apology, a flicker of shame at his last comment. He sent back a wave of love and reassurance so strong, it nearly knocked her over. Good thing his wife was as agile as one of the cliff lizards, sunning themselves on the rocky outcroppings several hundred clicks beneath their balcony.

“You’re cornier than a nerf-herder,” she retorted, deflecting some of the smothering warmth. Rey still struggled with his sweeping shows of affection sometimes, which Ben found highly ironic since she’d given up literally everything, flown fully across two galaxies, risked death at the hands of his oldest enemy, at the first hint that he might be redeemed. And he hadn’t even had the good grace to accept her help, then.

Shaking his head at the memory of their synchronous fight in that throne room, their duet of death and destruction that ended in his rather embarrassing knock-out defeat, Ben allowed himself a smirk at her response. “What do you know about nerf-herding? You’re just a nobody from Jakku.”

Rey swelled with mock-pride— a change in posture that had Ben’s attention flick down to her budlike breasts, straining against the leaf-green silk… “I’ll have you know, Ben Solo, that we Jakkuvian nobodies know quite a bit about nerf-herding— although not as much as royal somebodies obviously do!”

Ben laughed outright and strode within arms’ reach of his wife. “Tell that to my mother tonight,” he murmured as a dare, before taking her waist in one of his large hands and reeling her in for a quick kiss. One which she immediately followed up with a longer, deeper oral exploration, snaking her arms around his neck as he lifted her a few inches off the plush blue carpet.

“Come, my binary sun,” Ben said as he broke away from her lips. He reached for one of Rey’s hands and brought it down to their sides. “I’m starved.”

Rey giggled, her lips red from kissing (she rarely wore make up— and she never needed it, in Ben’s opinion). “I suppose one quarter portion just isn’t enough for a Sith Lord like you…”

Ben’s stomach growled even as he nipped at Rey’s pert little nose. “I’ll give you sixty portions later, you little sarlacc,” he whispered and bent to kiss her neck, lingering there to nibble as she squealed in mock protest.

_I_ _’ll give you all of me._


	4. Morning Dew

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey doesn't know how to swim, but that doesn't stop her from getting soaked in the Lake Country...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been depressed, hence the lack of chapters lately, but here: have a blowjob! and the start of some interrogation scene kink!

It was nearly noon by the time Ben returned from his morning swim, and Rey was already up and about, tinkering away at her latest project: waterproofing a comm link for her husband to bring with him into the Solleu.

It wasn’t that Rey didn’t trust Ben’s ability to swim— although she was still a little suspicious of the activity’s safety, given her own inability— it’s just that she’d heard tell of the many monsters that lurked in Naboo’s waterways and worried that one might catch her husband unawares and alone (and substantially upriver from her— Rey could only assume, based on the lengths of his first-light forays, that Ben swam far and wide in the nearby tributary). This anxiety, unfounded as it was, had made her fidget for days.

Last night, in an effort to appease his wife, Ben had dug up some old comm links from his grandfather’s day. They were, after all, spending the next month at his grandmother’s lake country estate; there was plenty of old gear from the Clone Wars lying about here. At his suggestion, she’d fixed the few she was able and salvaged the rest for spare parts to practice on— it’s not like she’d had much experience with waterproofing electronics, coming from a desolate desert planet…

On Jakku, the mechanic’s worst enemy was sand, so sand-proofing was the first thing Rey’d taught herself, whiling away the lonely hours in her little makeshift hut. She’d hated sand with a passion, and was glad to be rid of its coarse, irritating grains. Just one could fry a fresh circuit; collectively, they managed to get _everywhere_.

Not that there wasn’t fun to be had in the desert sun— when they’d spent half a year in seclusion on Tatooine, Ben had been the one to teach her just how much fun… And the only time Rey actually missed her home planet was when she thought about surfing down the dunes on a piece of flat scrap, or scaling an old Star Destroyer, half-buried by the shifting sands.

But Ben satisfied her need for exhilaration every night,brought new stars to life behind the lids of her eyes. She could climb his tall frame like a human AT-AT,slide her fingers down ravines of his rippling musculature. Speaking of which…

As Rey tinkered away at her soon-to-be second failed attempt, something dark and dripping caught her eye, distracting her from the live wires of the open link. Ben’s glossy black mane appeared before the rest of him, just breaching the balcony’s edge. Her head darted up as first his face, then broad torso come into view— he must’ve been taking the stone steps two at a time, evidently not exhausted despite several hours’ swimming against a strong current. Or maybe he’d only lazed away the morning by the banks, meditating among the rushes and reeds.

Ben wore a white shirt with long sleeves, wet to the point of clinging transparency, and fitted brown leggings he’d found in the small collection of clothes that his grandfather had left here, so many years ago. Clearly, Anakin Skywalker had been muscular, but hadn’t cut quite the same figure as her ridiculously strong husband. Ben’s thick thighs and carved calves strained against the soft fabric with every stride.

Rey stared shamelessly at the specimen stepping past the stone balustrade, having conquered the last stair. Ben’s gaze riveted to hers as he stalked towards her shady alcove, growing hot and heavy-lidded as he took in her minimallate morning attire. Rey smirked slightly, realizing she hadn’t thrown a robe over her sheer sleepwear. Internally, she shrugged, and blamed the summer heat— so much for the famed cooling lake country breezes…

Coming to to a halt at the edge of the shadow in which she sat, Ben shook his head like a Wookiee, sending water droplets to land dangerously near her work in progress. Not that she noticed— no, Rey was too busy gawking at her husband, who had finished rolling his neck and was now raising his arms above his head, arching his back like a great cat as he stretched lazily in one direction, and then another.

Damp linen slid up and over his honed abdomen, revealing the dark trail that led down under the band of his trousers— themselves slung low enough to show off the deep V of his hips. Rey fanned herself as discreetly as possible with a piece of scrap metal, but Ben saw and sent her a wink that hit her body with the force of a blaster.

“Don’t you have a cowl or something you could put on?” She called out teasingly. Ben lowered his arms and threw his head back in laughter. The sound made something inside Rey go molten. “Seriously, Ben, I can see everything. Everything except the point of your wearing anything right now.”

“I didn’t want to offend any of the locals with my naked body,” Ben offered, stepping over the curved border of the shadow the awning cast against the stone surface of the balcony.

“Nudity’s not exactly an issue once you’re _in_ the water, though, is it?” Rey muttered, mostly to herself. She’d spied on him in the early mornings after he left her alone in bed, seen him strip stark naked at the water’s edge and then disappear, the pale skin of his sculpted ass flickering for a second like a flare beneath the surface. Somehow, her husband never managed to catch a tan.

“I beg your pardon, Princess?” Ben’s voice was low and rich with amusement, deeper than the planet’s oceanic core. And it was coming from directly above her, seated as she was on the wrought iron settee. Processing her nearly-nude husband’s proximity, Rey blushed profusely.

“Ben! You’re dripping!” She cried, flustered, and gestured vaguely at her mess of a makeshift workbench.

To her husband’s credit, he stepped back. Rey lifted her head to thank him, only to find that he was in the process of removing his sopping wet shirt— as slowly as humanly possible— and staring at her all the while. _Gods, he looked good._ Rey squirmed in her seat.

“I hope I’m not the only one,” Ben murmured, tossing the offending garment aside. It slapped the sun-baked stone and settled into a heap. He stepped forward again, looming over her— crowding Rey with his carved musculature.

Rey could feel the heat coming off Ben’s body and marveled that the droplets still clinging to him hadn’t evaporated into steam. She tried to cross her legs discreetly, hide the moisturegathering at her thighs’ apex, but Ben’s legs were in the way. He moved closer with a small smile, nudging her knees apart.

“Ah… it appears I’m not,” he continued in a voice as black and hungry as a starless night. Delight wound its way through his words. Rey could feel herself caving to arousal, her body swaying towards him as his inherent magnetism sucked her in.

Their proximity forced her to make a choice: look up, past a wall of muscle, into his eyes like black holes of heady hope and hot desire; or make direct eye-contact with his ever-increasing erection, bulging uneven beneath the tight, wet material of Ben’s borrowed leggings.

Swallowing hard, Rey made her decision. She stared straight ahead.

Without bothering to look down at what she was doing, Rey shoved her shitty project aside and lifted her hands to Ben’s hips in one swift, shaky movement.

At this careful contact, Ben sucked in his breath. His cock twitched and continued to grow. Rey grinned, glancing up to find her husband gazing down at her, surprise and pleading mixed in his midnight eyes.

Rarely did Ben ask Rey to perform this particular act, preferring to treat his wife to his careful attentions. But lately, Rey had discovered that she loved to lick the salt from Ben’s skin after he’d been out for a swim. Why shouldn’t they both take a long, luxurious morning plunge?

Ben’s bitten lip and molten gaze mesmerized Rey. Slowly, she allowed her hands to skim the line where smooth fabric bared smoother skin. Eventually, Rey’s arms encircled Ben’s waist entirely, and she searched with a scavenger’s touch for the ties that held his leggings on his hips.

As she’d inched along his waist, Rey had been brought closer to Ben until her torso just barely touched his abdomen— his erection, hidden beneath the layer of damp cloth, now skimmed the valley between her small, perky breasts. Rey’s nipples pebbled at the memory of his touch last night, the velvety skin of his cock trailing down that hollow before it thrust hard into the waiting hole far below…

She ached for him again, trying and failing to keep a teasing distance. Rey’s legs were already splayed by Ben’s earlier investigation, and the flimsy fabric of her sleep shorts was as wet now as the stretched cloth of Ben’s leggings.

 _Blast it_ , she thought, pressing her forehead to Ben’s abdominal muscles, hard as the golden stone on which her feet rested. _Where the hell are the ties to this thing?_

Sensing her keening frustration, Ben answered Rey’s unspoken question. “I tucked the cords into the band, darling.” The flicker of amusement in his answer warred with his raging arousal.

In thanks, Rey lifted her head and pressed a kiss to his belly, where the trail of hairs leading down to his straining cock started. Then, letting her lips linger there, she fished the ties out of the back of Ben’s leggings and with one swift yank managed to unknot them. _Let the fun begin…_

Of course, the material was too damp, and Ben’s skin to sticky with salt, for the leggings to simply slide off of him. Which meant that Rey had the exquisite, teasing pleasure of pulling them slowly from him.

Initially, Ben tried to shirk the garment hastily and step free, but Rey clutched the waistband of the leggings in both her hands. “Not so fast, husband,” she murmured, pulling her head back to flash a winning smile up at his contorted face. “I think I’m going to take my time.”

Ben exhaled shakily, his cock jutting hard against the material in a physical plea for release— and _release_. Rey continued to grin, shimmying the material slowly down her husband’s narrow hips and relishing the little noises he made as his sensitive skin caught its friction. She loosened the waistband further as she reached the tip of his erection, taking care not to rub too much against the head of his cock.

His flesh was ruddy there, and swollen, and a pearl of pre-cum seeped from the tiny slit. Rey paused her reverse strip tease, unable to resist pressing a chaste kiss to the velvety skin— or swiping her tongue out to lap up the white liquid, eliciting a hiss from her husband. Rey grinned and started to pull away, but one of Ben’s hands had come to cover her hand on his ass, while clutched the back of her head, fingers knotting in her messy hair.

“Patience, husband,” she whispered, letting her breath fan across the part of his cock she’d exposed to the summer air. 

Ben tightened his grip on her hair, forcing her to look up at him. Their eyes met, his as bright and stormy as a night on Exegol as he growled, “Off.”

Rey had to suppress her amusement. Her husband thought he was calling the shots, now? When had that ever been the case?

Nevertheless, Rey decided to play along. She could torment him all the better later, if she gave into his greed at this stage in the game…

“Yes, dear,” she murmured with false meekness, and dropped the waistband of his leggings so that the entire garment slid to the ground.Ben’s eyes widened with desire and surprise— at her acquiescence— when she helped him step out of the damp material. “Is that better?”

He nodded, and Rey ducked her head to hide her grin. Ben had a big storm coming, if he thought this was going to be fast and easy for him…Still, there was no denying the mutual desire and shared urgency, the shiver along their force bond, when she took the length of him in her two hands.

After positioning herself to fully take him into her mouth, Rey looked up at Ben. His eyes were half closed, but they found hers and locked contact. She licked her lips and, without looking back down, slowly enveloped the throbbing length of him.

Ben _groaned_. He whimpered. He whispered her name— along with a hundred other mumbled pleas. Smiling as best she could around the cock stuffed in her mouth, Rey slid down and down until her lips brushed the base of his dick and his tip twitched against the back of her throat.

Ben had once expressed his amazement at her ability to deep-throat him, or so she’d heard it called, on demand. The way she’d explained it to him, she was still just a starving scavenger— eager to swallow as much sustenance as she could. So, swallow— and suck— she would.

Without letting his cock slide from her mouth, Rey slid from the settee to kneel at her husband’s feet. He continued to mutter sweet nothings, one hand still twisted tight in her buns while the other had come to caress her jaw, flex lightly around her bared throat.

Rey swallowed convulsively, and began to suck, swirling her tongue along his thick, throbbing length. She moaned as she moved on him, letting the sound vibrate in and around them both. Ben stroked her throat with carefully controlled tenderness, letting his head fall back in ecstasy as she lifted one hand to cup his weighted balls.

 _I love you_ , she murmured wordlessly. The bond was a live wire between their bodies and minds.

 _I need you_ , he answered plaintively, responding with force in kind.

“Too bad,” she replied, releasing him with a wet pop, rising to her feet beside him before he had time to think. Ben blinked down at her as she took his hand and stood, grinning wickedly. “Because I’m going to make you wait for this one.”

Rey pecked her husband’s cheek then turned and darted through the open terrace door, toward their bedroom.Tugged along behind her, naked as the day he was born, Ben struggled to process what was going on.

“I don’t understand!” He called out, trying and failing to slow Rey’s rapid footsteps.

“You left me waiting all morning for you,” she said at last, turning her back to their bedroom, walking into the gauzy suite blindly but agilely as she looked at him instead of where she was going. “So I’m going to make you wait all afternoon for me,” she finished with a wicked glint and that untamed grin.

Rey’s eyes flicked over to the silk bed curtains and back. Following her gaze, Ben lingered on the sight as the memory of last night hit him hard— and hot. He nodded slowly as he put the pieces together and realized, with dark pleasure, what exquisite agony he was in for. Rey’s impish smile increased in size.

Evidently, Rey had decided it was once again time for _The_ _Interrogation of Kylo Ren_ — or, as she liked to call it, “I get to do what you did to me! But naked. And consensually!” Ben did not object to playing this little game of theirs in the slightest. Especially because it inevitably ended with her impatiently impaling herself on him, about five minutes in…

Rey began to gather the gauzy material in bunches, motioning for Ben to take up his “interrogation” position on the bed. They went over safe-words and the tightness of various knots as she worked, and Ben remained fully erect throughout the entire process.

“Can I force-choke you, this time?”

 _Abso-fucking-lutely,_ came his force-fueled answer, earning him two kisses: one on his lips, and one on the tip of his hardened dick. Let the games begin…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Maybe next time he'll teach her how to actually swim...


	5. Pre-Festival Fretting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben's brooding about the upcoming, annual festival on Naboo. Rey's just had her hair done by a gossipy Gungan. As usual, the two find hope and healing together (with the help of holograms and a hint of pleasure).

“Aren’t you excited for the party?”

Not really.

“Your mother said it’s an annual tradition!”

It was, or rather it had been before the advent of the First Order. Ben remembered attending the event as a small child, trussed up in his festival-best, only to be sent off to bed before the after-party started. Ever since the long awaited (and negotiated…) peace treaty had been signed by all relevant parties, the Nabooan nobility had been trying to revive the yearly celebration, somewhat unsuccessfully.

Ben wasn’t sure why their earlier efforts had failed. Perhaps, during those first few years, the locals had distrusted their hard-won security and were wary of celebrating something so fragile and new. Maybe, after over a decade’s resistance, they simply couldn’t summon the energy. War wearied, _that_ Ben knew.

But peace exhausted, too. The endless politics, the meting out of justice, the unfamiliarity of this unbloodied way of living. Ben found the first tiresome, while the second made him feel ashamed. As for the third… well, that left him brooding— its implications blackened Ben’s mood. War shouldn’t be like oxygen, nor fear the only air he knew how to breathe. But he wasn’t used to this brave new world of peace and politics and after-parties.

A piece of him craved cruelty and conflict; some sliver of his self still preferred “Kylo” to “Ben.” He felt powerless to eradicate that inner Ren, ingrained deep within him.

But with his wife’s help, perhaps— _perhaps_ — this festival could be fun. She shone like a beacon, bright, shattering his shadows, whether they crowded his mind in the middle of the day or crept in with the cold wind at night.

“Poe’s coming all the way from the Outer Rim!” Rey continued, capturing Ben’s attention. She was bouncing a little on the balls of her bare feet, now, not far from the spot of blue carpet Ben had been studying glumly. He lifted his head at the intriguing information, and couldn’t help but smile at the sight of his wife, half-styled.

They were back in Theed, lounging about in the antechamber of the Amidalan Suite as Rey recounted various gossip she’d heard from her hairdresser. Not yet dressed, she looked a little top-heavy with her hair styled high and wide, in accordance with traditional festival fashion. The sight of her skimpy shift and tasseled hair was as endearing as it was arousing, and her excited conversation was a glad distraction from his darker thoughts.

“I could have sworn Poe sent his regrets…” His mother had been heart-broken, and enlisted Ben’s help in rearranging the seating chart.

Rey beamed. “Apparently, he sent a last-minute hologram to Leia— his mission ended early, so he’ll be able to make it this year, cocktails and all!”

Ben smiled half-heartedly in return. “That’s good.”

“Isn’t it grand? I can show him the modifications I made to the Falcon’s bridge regulator! He’ll probably be furious with me once he’s seen what I’ve done with the compressor, but it’s his fault for giving me the idea in the first place…”

Rey rambled on about the ship’s infamously faulty mechanics for a minute or two before picking up on Ben’s lack of response. Not wanting her to ask him what was wrong, he voiced a question of his own.

“Will Finn be flying in with him?”

His wife’s face fell at the mention of her best friend. “No, still stuck on Bespin, negotiating funding.” Finn’s latest project had proven expensive, so he and Jannah had decided to pay a visit to her father’s former set in Cloud City.

Ben sighed deeply. He’d been hoping Finn would show.

The two had struck up an unlikely friendship, in the aftermath of Exegol. Unlike Poe, who had been raised in the Resistance, or Rose, whose sister had died fighting the First Order, Finn could sympathize with Ben. Not because he’d been complicit in a genocidal regime— well, not to the same extent that Ben had been— but because he’d experienced their sinister brainwashing firsthand.

Finn, more than anyone, understood the grooming Ben had undergone from before he’d even drawn breath. Finn didn’t fear that sliver of Ben’s soul, didn’t see him as merely a “reformed Kylo Ren.”

Ben’s relationship with Finn’s boyfriend, on the other hand, was still a little rough around the edges…

“Poe will be on his best behavior,” Rey promised in a soothing voice, sensing his unease. “If he makes a single joke about Leia liking him better, I’ll get him drunker than that time on Coruscant and shave his sleeping head with my saber.”

Ben let out an involuntary bark of laughter at the image. Rey’s eyes twinkled but she assured him she was serious. His wife would do anything to protect him from his past.

“That’s too cruel,” Ben replied with a smile. A surge of love and gratitude threatened to tug him off the cushioned settee, and set him kneeling at Rey’s feet. He settled for standing tall and taking her in his arms. Ben swallowed Rey’s little gasp of pleasure as he swept her off the carpet, kissing her with open-mouthed abandon.

It was a testament to her talkative hairdresser that not one tassel fell from Rey’s carefully quaffed hair, because Ben’s fingers were doing their best to dislodge them all in his haste to cup the back of his wife’s head, dip her low as his tongue probed slow and deep.

Ten minutes later, they were both on their knees, surrounded by a circle of hairpins and clothing— including all of his and Rey’s underthings.

Ben would feel bad about the mess they’d made, but he was too busy sliding the blunt head of his cock between his wife’s slick folds to remember the existence of anything other than their shared, and shouted, pleasure.

That cold, cruel sliver of his soul warmed with her every ecstatic shiver.


	6. Calm Before the Court/Storm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben greets Poe on the day of the festival, then makes his way to Rey in the throne room. Lots of musings.

“Ren!”

A vibrant voice echoed across the spacious stone hangar. Poe Dameron swung out of his pristine x-wing and proceeded to swagger across the polished floor like he owned it, attached palace and all. It wasn’t until he reached Ben’s side that he corrected himself, to the latter man’s frustration.

“I mean, Ben! Easy mistake, won’t happen again…” Poe grinned up at him, unbothered by his scowl.

 _Bullshit_.

The use of his Sith moniker, yelled loud enough for every alighting guest in the royal hangar could hear, was no simple slip. Dameron was doing his best to get a rise out of Ben. And if it weren’t for the fact that he’d promised Rey he’d be the soul of civility, Ben would have struck back with an insult of his own. Assuming he could think of one— anxiety over tonight’s festivities seemed to have stolen Solo’s wits.

“Poe,” he ground out while the other man executed an overly enthusiastic bow, making a mockery of courtly etiquette. (Never mind that Ben hated etiquette…)

“What a pity your partner isn’t in attendance,” he continued in the place of a cruel quip. And he meant it; Ben would miss Finn’s steady presence at the impending public spectacle.

“He’s a hard worker, my man.” Poe bit his lip and looked off towards the cliffs, lost in a lover’s momentary reminisce. Ben cleared his throat awkwardly, and jerked his head in the direction of the exit. They’d be late if they didn’t hurry.

“But what about you— where’s your better half?” Poe smirked as he spoke, ostensibly making a harmless joke. But in Ben’s case, it was a universally known and commented upon fact that Rey deserved someone who hadn’t succumbed to the dark side of the force. No one on Naboo knew why she’d married him, much less bothered to turn and save him. No one, including Ben.

A snicker behind them reminded Ben that they had an audience in the hangar, and if he wanted to avoid disappointing his darling wife— which was worse than incurring her wrath, he’d discovered— Ben would have to abstain from planting his fist in the other man’s face. A prince didn’t punch even impolite guests, not in front of fifty-odd witnesses…

Ben took a deep breath and tried to center himself on Rey’s scent— star-blossoms, sunshine, and a hint of diesel fumes… He’d been practicing meditating on the memory for months, so that the next time a diplomatic crisis stole him from her side, he’d still be able to summon the calm he felt in her presence. Imperfectly, the exercise worked. Ben relaxed his fists and tense frown.

“My wife is greeting a delegation from the Outer Rim. She was adamant that I show you to your suite so that you’d have a chance to change out of your flight suit before making your formal entrance to court.” He paused, pushing down the anxiety that arose at even mentioning that mess of etiquette and politics. “I trust you’ll be able to find your way to the throne room without my assistance.”

Poe clapped Ben on the back, and the taller man jumped at the unexpected contact. “Bennyboy, I know the layout of this palace better than the Hosnian system. Besides, your mother used to have me over all the time, before you were back in the picture.”

His voice was blithe, but there was an edge to it; Poe had never liked coming second on the list of Leia’s favorites, and now that Ben was himself again… well, his mother had left Dameron rather in the dust. Ben allowed himself a small smile, however uncomfortable he was still at having his mother’s unconditional forgiveness and undivided focus.

The two rivals, as it were, continued their tense banter all the way to Dameron’s door. He would be staying in a set of small rooms overlooking the city rather than the cliffs. Poe wasn’t important enough, compared to some of their other guests, to occupy a suite with a view comparable to that of the Amidalan rooms. But it wasn’t as though the sight of the city was such a travesty— especially not tonight, when the streets were decorated so elaborately.

Ben left Poe with a curt farewell and a warning not to miss the opening formalities. Then he started back through the winding halls, fear dogging his footsteps as he drew closer to the cavernous throne room.

His anxiety must have spilled over into their bond, because Rey reached out to him through the force. Ben was turning the corner of a red and gold -trimmed corridor when he heard his wife’s voice echo in his mind.

_Ben? Darling? Are you there?_

I’m always here, he answered her with a smile.

_What’s happened? You’re so full of conflict, I can feel it from here._

Nothing, it’s fine. I’m fine.

 _Don’t_ nothing _me, Ben Solo. I’m literally your soulmate. You can’t hide your feelings from me_.

Rey’s tone, so imperious, so irritable, made Ben laugh a little in the narrow hall. A passing servant shot him a confused look, but Ben didn’t mind being thought strange by a stranger. Not when his soulmate could solve the mysteries of his mind in a matter of seconds. He chose his words carefully, when he answered. Didn’t want to upset her unnecessarily by bringing up Poe’s impertinence.

I’m nervous. About tonight.

_You’re nervous? I’m alone in the throne room, trussed up like a Pike princess!_

You may not be a Pike, Ben responded, amused, but you are “ _literally_ ” a princess.

_I wish someone had told me that when I married you._

I did…

He could practically hear her eye roll from here. And then there was silence along the force bond, a partial severing as she turned her attention away from her husband and back to the courtiers and guests.

Ben suspected the throne room was an absolute crush, given the time, and while he was grateful that Poe’s delayed arrival had caused him to miss most of the small talk, he felt a nagging thread of guilt about leaving his wife to fend for herself among the other nobles.

It wasn’t that Rey couldn’t fend for herself— his little scavenger was light years ahead of him in terms of self-sufficiency—just that she was a stranger to the pomp and circumstance, prone to shutting down in a panic when overwhelmed, and unused to large, loud crowds. Her curiosity and tenacity combined got her through most court functions, but there was always a tipping point, a cliff she would reach, and Ben’s job was to be there to catch her.

That, and to act as her personal bouncer/bodyguard.

Rey objected to the latter role, calling Ben “overbearing” and “brooding,” which, if he were being honest with himself, he usually was. At court, at least, where he felt like an animal in a menagerie. But she didn’t mind having Ben on hand to answer her many force-whispered questions, which left him to play the part of a living encyclopedia/etiquette book.

It was only right, he supposed, and fair, that he play that role. Rey was a quick learner and intuitive in the field, but neither quality made up for her having grown up practically feral in the vast desert wastes of Jakku. Ben, on the other hand, had spent the first decade or so of his life immersed in the high courts of Alderaan and Naboo.

He’d been taught the appropriate etiquette for Naboo’s nobility, for galactic politics, for every conceivable formal circumstance, by a special tutor hired by his mother. He knew the smugglers’ code and customs, too, thanks to his father, although those lessons had grown less useful as he’d stepped into his destined role.

As Obi-Wan “Ben” Solo, Crown Prince of Alderaan and sole heir to the Elder House Organa, he was an active political player in various local and galactic affairs. As the grandson of a revered queen and later senator of Naboo, he had more status than power, but even still, his influence was substantial.

Rey, a veritable “nobody,” as he himself had once called her, possessed significant power as his wife and consort, according to Alderaan law. Her place in the Nabooan court was more uncertain, and she lacked his blood-borne status. With Leia installed as acting monarch, however, for an as of yet unspecified term, Rey had been encouraged to shoulder many of the burdens of diplomat and figurehead, with regards to both Nabooan and Alderaan politics.

(The two were so closely linked, ever since the refugee population of Alderaan had taken up residence on Naboo many decades ago, that the democratic assemblies had quietly merged into a single entity. It was easier that way, especially with Leia as a living link.)

But politics were starting to take their toll on Rey, much as peace talks had eaten away at Ben. He knew she was glad to be setting down roots, but a part of her missed her freedom— and even her former hard-living. Soon enough, Ben suspected, Rey would want to fly court’s gilded cage, and set off on her heart’s mission, with him at her side.

They’d set up schools across the stars, for force sensitive children to learn about their abilities. They wouldn’t train any in the ancient ways of the Jedi— when that order had died with Luke, it had been for the best, both agreed. But they’d offer answers and assistance, control and guidance, and teach the truth about the universe, the force, and the self.

_No one would have to be alone anymore, no child would be abandoned or feel ashamed._

It was Ben’s dream, as much as it was Rey’s. But in order to see their secret plans to fruition, they needed political support— and that required a convincing display of Ben’s remorse and rehabilitation as well as Rey’s constant appearances at court.

Speaking of which… Ben rounded a corner, deep in thought, and nearly stumbled into the cavernous throne room. Immediately, his head turned towards Rey, his gaze snapped to meet hers.

_That took you long enough_...

Her tone was dry, and he could feel relief ripple palpably along their bond. Ben had left his wife alone among the savages too long.

Smothering a sigh, he straightened his posture and made his way with long strides to Rey Solo’s side.


End file.
